At the same time, Microsoft has given its users a way to use Apple iPads with Office. Since Apple and Android tablet sales have been rising even while Windows PC sales have fallen, this move strikes me as undercutting their own primary market at a time when it's already in trouble. How wise can this really be?

Can Microsoft woo its hardware partners back? It's going to take more than just a better version of Windows. I suspect that behind closed doors, Microsoft brass will be offering OEMs deals almost as sweet at its no cost Windows Phone effort to claim some mobile market-share.

It's going to be very interesting to watch how this plays out. By this time next year we'll know if Microsoft has managed to reclaim its users' and vendors' mind-share, or if we really are seeing the end of the PC computing market in favor of a mobile, cloud-based computing paradigm. At this point, I could see it going either way.

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